WHI: Improving The Lives Of Postmenopausal Women

(BlackDoctor.org) — In 1996, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) established the Women’s Health Initiative (WHI), a 15–year study to address the most common causes of death, disability, and impaired quality of life in postmenopausal women: cardiovascular disease, cancer, and osteoporosis. The WHI was a multi-million-dollar endeavor, and one of the largest U.S. prevention studies of its kind. More than 160,000 generally healthy postmenopausal women, aged 50 to 79, participated in one or more of several studies: an observational study to identify predictors of disease, a randomized controlled clinical trial of promising but unproven approaches to prevention, and a study of community approaches to developing healthful behavior.

Gene Gary–Williams, PhD, and a former Dean of Allied Health Sciences at Howard University, was recruited by one of her colleagues, who said, “I think you ought to be a part of this study.”

“I was 60 years old when I started,” recalls Gary-Williams, “and I was in the study seven years. I went through to the end, even though along the way I was out of the Washington area. “I just felt good about doing something I felt was important.”

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She couldn’t understand friends who decided not to participate because they didn’t have time, or “don’t like to do things like that,” or “found it inconvenient.”

“I think a lot of times people are suspicious and they don’t even know it,” said Gary-Williams. “It’s not something we deal with easily as people. But it is my strong belief that as we grow older we need to leave something. African-American people in general have not been involved in many of the medical studies. For a long time, we weren’t invited and then, when the opportunity presented itself, we were too suspicious. I’m a health care professional, and I do understand the importance of this study — for my daughter, for any grandchildren I have, and for all of the other women of color who come after me. As women of color, we need to participate so that we can provide information researchers would not be able to get otherwise.”